Review: Air Vent Dweller — Race to the Bottom

Air Vent Dweller
Race to the Bottom
doodlepunk records
Street: 03.13.2026
Air Vent Dweller = early The Garden + Gang of Four’s Solid Gold chopped, smoked and fucked?

Race to the Bottom marks Air Vent Dweller’s first full length project since originator Charlie Pell’s first release under the name back in December 2021. In recent decades, groups who fall under the wide punk umbrella have seemingly shied away from full-length releases and sit happily with years between projects. Air Vent Dweller is no different, just now coming around to relapsing and releasing something more than two to three songs long. Pell’s work is radiated, compressed and hyperactive, pushing the limits of recording and production into refreshing new forms that one may call crunchy or outright broken. Race to the Bottom, in collaboration GONK’s Alex Sandoval, has cemented one of the goofiest outfits of the SLC underground. 

Air Vent Dweller’s best quality is their experimentation with the full realm of unpleasant tones, textures and approaches to song writing. Race to the Bottom is a short exercise in the power and limits of compression and distortion — a hallmark of the egg punk genre — that turns the screw deeper in my figurative skull and literal eardrum. It’s charming and invigorating to take in and be punished by. Beyond the standard boom of a bass drum that’s blown out the microphone, Air Vent Dweller plays with squealing synths that range from silly, melodic riffs to buzzing needles that are so high that it can become inaudible. Paired with a chorus of screaming vocals, there’s so many pieces to pick apart and love. The title track, “race to the bottom” is the classic punk groove — bass-led and heavy with a simple lead guitar riff over top that, over its 3:34 minute duration, speeds up and slows to a nasty chug. It is, to me, the highlight of the record and a perfect namesake for the record. 

There aren’t many groups who clearly compose their individual elements so as to not become a wall of fuzz when that dial is turned up but are willing to sacrifice the clarity of their vocals at the same time — though this can become gimmicky. Niche-r genres can suffer from their unique conventions and start to all blur into the perfect average of that genre’s sound. Race to the Bottom, though under twenty minutes, does tread this line and fall off it in certain moments, especially on a track like “Waiting.” Incredibly heavy and loud, “Waiting” is a drop off that encapsulates when distortion becomes unintelligible and impossible to pick through. The momentary peak-a-boo of clearer guitar riffs isn’t enough to raise it out of the mud. 

Air Vent Dweller is one SLC’s hallmark second wave egg punk groups, originating from a COVID isolation that led many in the world to turn toward DIY music. And it’s a time when the genre is at a new high — GONK (presumably with Pell on the bass) will be performing at this year’s Kilby Block Party 6 — national groups like Snõõper now get signed to major labels like Jack White’s Third Man Records, and the dividing line between the chain and egg punks as blurred to near obscurity, existing only as a meme that barely signified anything to begin with. The final track on the record, “Many Lane Highway (demo),” hints at a bright and more melodic future for Air Vent Dweller. —wphughes

Read more local music reviews:
Local Review: Ritt Momney — BASE 
Local Music Singles Roundup: March 2026